Two - Recoil.
"You talk and I'll listen."
"I don't want a drink."
"Okay," he says, then pauses, considers making an inappropriate joke about how they could do something else, maybe something a little more physical. Then he decides that he values his life too much. Instead, he tries one more time. "One drink. I'll talk, you listen."
"Tony!" She is exasperated at his insistence. "No." She doesn't need him to snap her out of her head space. As she kept repeating to everyone, she is fine. If she says it enough times, maybe she can will it to be true. Before he can open his mouth to say anything else, she grabs her stuff and stalks away. She doesn't bother to wait for the elevator. The last thing she wants is to be stuck in an elevator with him and his eyes that seem to see right through her defenses. Instead, she fairly flies down the stairs and out to her car.
She doesn't look back to see if he is chasing her, but when she doesn't see him in her rear view mirror, she refuses to acknowledge the disappointment that bubbles up from her core.
She drives to the same bar she had been frequenting for this case, thinking that he will not look for her here, at this place where she went undercover to catch a serial killer. Before she can order a drink at the bar, the bartender she befriended, Heidi, sits a mojito in front of her. "Thank you, friend," she says with a tired smile.
Heidi smiles back and moves over to take an order. Heidi's husband is currently deployed, and that had made her a prime target for Andy until Ziva stepped in as Gina and changed the course of his actions. As she thinks back on this, she stares at the small television behind the bar, where a woman wearing a horse face mask is rebuffing the advances of a man. Americans are so strange.
Her thoughts are interrupted by a man's voice. "Let me buy you the next one?" It is not the man she expected, but Michael Locke, one of the men to whom she had spoken while undercover. They talk, flirting a bit. He is handsome, tall and dark haired. He is searching for his ex-girlfriend, who dumped him and then disappeared, so Ziva figures it is safe to flirt with him. He describes her. "Smart. Funny. Terrible sense of direction. Drives you insane with her incessant movie references. Worries about others more than herself. Generous to a fault."
This sounds like someone she knows, someone she is trying to avoid yet for whom she is waiting. As if he hears her thoughts, she hears footsteps behind her and a familiar voice say cheerfully, "Hey, sweet cheeks. I'm sorry I'm late."
It is Tony, and he puts an arm around her and kisses the top of her head. It is a possessive move. She looks up at him in confusion and sees him staring pointedly at Michael. Michael raises his hands and backs away. "Hey, sorry, I didn't know she's attached," he says. He gives her a rueful smile and walks away.
Tony takes the newly vacated seat next to her, grinning. Smugly, she thinks. She sets her jaw and glares at him.
"I went to your apartment first, but you weren't home. So then I went to the bar near the office but of course you wouldn't be there. This is the second bar I checked," he says by way of explanation, the concern in his eyes belying his light tone of voice.
After a long moment where she contemplates what to say, she says in a flat voice, "I told you that I did not want a drink, Tony." He smirks and gestures at the half empty glass in front of her. "I did not want a drink with you," she clarifies, hoping to hurt his feelings so he will go away.
His cheeky grin doesn't waver although she sees something flicker in his eyes. "Well, you know me," he says. "I can never take a hint." He looks away from her finally to catch Heidi's attention and Ziva feels like she can breathe again.
Before Heidi can make her way over to him, Ziva hisses at him, "I will give you more than a hint then," drops some money on the bar to pay for her drinks, and stalks out before he can say anything in response.
This time, he chases after her. He catches up and grabs her arm just as she reaches her car. "What do you want, Tony?" she snaps at him.
He stands his ground, accustomed to her anger, sometimes even provoking it for sport. Now though, he is not doing it for fun. He is genuinely concerned for her, and he tells her that, dropping the faux-cheery tone for a serious one.
"Why?" she demands, trying ineffectively to pull her arm from his grip. "I am fine."
He chuckles mirthlessly, piercing her with a dark look. "You're not fine," he says bluntly.
Her eyes narrow. "Oh? And you're an expert in how I feel now?" she spits out.
"You're not exactly hiding how not fine you are," he replies, his voice almost a growl. He does not let go of her arm. Instead, he steps closer to her so she can smell the mint on his breath.
"Let me go," she says through clenched jaw. Contrarian that he is, he holds on to her tighter instead. Tears threaten to fall and she struggles against him. She does not want to cry in front of him. She will not break.
Except in his proximity, her emotions are heightened and there is nothing that she can do to change that. A whimper breaks through her clenched jaw and all the fight goes out of her. She falls limp against him and cries.
He says nothing, just holds her as she sobs into his starched button down, steady and warm and understanding. A pillar of strength.
After an indeterminate amount of time, the tears finally stop and she finds that she does not need to lean against him in order to keep standing anymore. She takes half a step away from him, just enough so she can look up at his face without breaking their embrace. He is looking down at her with a look so intense that it almost makes her flinch. Instead, she sniffles and asks, "Why did you come after me?"
He doesn't answer at first, just flits his eyes across her face, looking for something, the correct answer to her question maybe. After a long pause, he responds, "Because I wanted to make sure you're alright."
She shakes her head at him. "But you already knew I was not. So why?"
"Because," he replies. She is about to tell him that because is not an answer, when he continues. "Because I didn't want you to be alone when you broke down."
It is not a sentiment that she is used to hearing, not so plainly. The men in her life, past and present, do not give voice to their emotions. Emotions are vulnerabilities. Yet here is her partner, staring down at her, still holding on to her. "Because we are partners, yes?" She asks because she is looking for affirmation, not because she is digging to see if he feels more. Or so she tells herself.
A hint of a smile twitches on his lips, which are as soft as they look. She knows from experience, although it was more than a year ago. The memory is etched into her subconscious. "Yes," he says, but then adds before her heart can sink, "But also because I care about you. You know, the way Rick cared about Ilsa in Casablanca. Not in the tragic way where I'm going to make you go back to your husband but in the 'I'll do anything for you even help out your husband-'."
She stops his rambling in the only way that seems appropriate in the moment, by breaching the gap between them and pressing her lips to his. He responds after a second, moving his lips against hers, seeking her tongue with his. They kiss with the familiarity of a couple who do this on a regular basis and she has the overwhelming sense that this is just what they should have done years ago, before this mission and before Jeanne Benoit.
After being the first to make the move, she is the first to break the kiss. She leans back and looks up at him, a promise on her lips. They are standing next to her car in a parking lot adjacent to a bar, and the world finally feels like it is upright after being tilted wrongly on its axis, and in this moment, she can finally breathe.